Eldbjørg and Tortelier

Yan Pascal Tortelier was chief conductor of the ISO from 2016-2019 and returns now to the podium with an exciting programme of passionate and majestic music from France and Finland. The soloist for the evening is the young Norwegian violin star Eldbjørg Hemsing, who has recently emerged as one of the most spirited European violinists of her generation. She captivated audiences from all over the world with her televised performance at the 2021 Nobel Prize ceremony. Here she performs the stunning Sibelius Violin Concerto, the composer's love letter to the instrument, in which his imagination and unique musical language are on dazzling display. 

The concert opens with a beautiful but rarely performed overture by the French composer Gabriel Fauré. The overture is to the opera Pénélope, composed in 1913 and based on the Odyssey. The second half features the spectacular Symphony in B-flat major by Ernest Chausson. Chausson was a pillar of French composition at the end of the 19th century and blended various contemporary styles in his symphony, which is simultaneously dramatic in scale and poetically refined.